branding

The perfect Web 2.0 company name

Monday, April 3rd, 2006
at 1:03pm

In looking at 1000tags, 360yahoo, 301url, 180news, 43deals, 43folders, 43places, 43things, 37signals, 30boxes, 30daytags, 30gigs, 24eyes, 24sevenoffice, 23hq, 16bugs, 9rules, 8by1, 4shared, 3bubbles, there are some real opportunities for a new startup being overlooked.

What to do, what to do? Well ...

First of all, shoot for the teens. Not teens as in MySpace teens; just look how crowded it is in the 40s, 30s and single-digit company space. 16Bugs just launched today, so there's plenty of room left there.

Second, astounding as it may seem, these companies are all using ".com" domains. I know, I couldn't believe it either. So there's plenty of opportunity to differentiate with a name that's a play on integrating the TLD extension into the company name itself.

Finally, again with the exception of 16Bugs, there is zero representation of the animal kingdom. (Zillow is worth mentioning here, since they represent the animal kingdom as shown on the Z page of Dr. Seuss's ABC: An Amazing Alphabet Book! ... but alas, no numbers in their name, so they don't really count.)

So in the spirit of sharing that drives Web 2.0, I offer this name for the taking: 19em.us

Not only does it include the correct plural spelling of emu, but an emu graces the cover of Learning Perl/Tk, a language combo that does not yet have an overhyped framework associated with it. We're talking about double-golden opportunity here.

Finally, it picks up some prime real estate in the teens. Who wouldn't want to be nestled into the love sandwich of 37signals on top, and 9rules on the bottom?

The only restriction I place on my contribution of this kick-ass company name to the community is a 5% equity stake so that when you flip it, I'll get my piece of the action. Thanks to the Web 2.0 Generator, all we need now is a product. (And hey, given that the emu is a flightless bird, there's nothing saying that 19em.us can't be a productless company! We'd be in good company there.)

Well, there you go. The domain's available--run, don't walk!